Well it depends on your budget. Intel Dual Core is supposed to be good, but so are AMD Athlons 64, Athlon X2 etc... [OT]Why Did you set the title to AMD?[/OT]
Everyone has their own preffered brand, AMD or Intel. Many people will tell you that AMD systems are generally better for gaming. In my opinion differences between Intel and AMD sysems are there, but they are vey small. My advice its to go with what best suits you budget, AMD's are cheaper as well
The cheapest X2 you can get is at $300 right now probably, which is the 3800+. A cheap, but pretty good motherboard can go from $75-100. I advice you get the AM2 since its newer and supports faster RAM then socket 939
Not anymore! AMD just had drastic price cuts to compete with Intel's new Core 2 chips coming out An X2 3800+ Windsor socket AM2 is selling for $149.99 on NewEgg! Great news for me, now I can build my system with a dual-core.
id spend my buks on a better gfx card. In games the prossessor is not nearly as important as the gfx card. Get a single core and sink your teeth into an awsome gfx card. Am2 is out and its the way forward. It supports the new ddr2 ram and in most instances its as cheap or cheaper than 939.
omg lol matt i could kiss u, why didnt i think of that, i jus remembered, my m8 who has a heap o sheet cluncker, but a better GFX than me, can run games on higher settins, he has a sempron 2600+ 512mb ram, and IDE 100 @ 5,400RPM hard drive, but a GeForce 6800 and can run all these games higher lol, if only I didnt buy this 3200, i could have spent an extra £30 on my GFX, and possibly got the GT version, O well, im an idiot
Okay we need some clear things here, everyone seems to have rambled on without asking the basics: Do you just want advice on the CPU or the whole system? How much money to you want to spend? (Budget) Do you need any peripherals? (Speakers, Monitor, keyboard etc etc - Related to the first question really if you're building whole system)
AnandTech: Intel Core 2 Duo E6300 & E6400: Tremendous Value Through Overclocking go with the E6300 or E6400 dual core as it performs as well (or better) than the FX-62 on stock hs/fan when OCd; the E6300 is going for $209 right now, but will soon drop when the X6900 is released.
btw, game performance is based on three things: vpu, cpu, and memory. most people don't know what to look for with vpu's though. They generally look at the memory and core speed, instead of the memory bandwidth (which really determines whether you're using the memory on the card or system memory).
It is a great value but not everyone is out to overlclock here. I know it's not difficult but there's always a risk that some don't care to take. Anyway as it's been said a ton the Intel Core 2 Duo is generally regarded as the fastest league out there. The lesser ones are still powerfull and don't cost much at all. However the GPU is the primary factor in you gaming performance so as long as you have a respectable Processor you'll be just fine. AMD has totally nailed the bang for the buck number with it's recent price cuts. You can now pick up a 3800+ single core processor at 2.4Ghz for $111 (this was a once $600+ model that's only improved) granted it'll be more expensive in Srilanka but it's all equivalants so you should still find them to be a good deal in comparison if you don't expect to get the very best out there.
I was about to buy an AMD AM2 3800+ for $250 before the Core2 line started coming out. The E6600 (what I'm getting) truely outpeforms the AMD FX-62 at stock and it cost me $350. Add some overclocking and it'll take me to the moon.
Yeah, Intel have done some amazing stuff with these Core 2 Duo CPU's, they really hit the spot and will now give AMD a run for their money.
